August 6

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , ,

What was advertised in a revolutionary American newspaper 250 years ago today?

Pennsylvania Evening Post (August 6, 1776).

“No advertisement will be inserted in this paper, if the money be not sent with it.”

Benjamin Towne, the printer of the Pennsylvania Evening Post, published a dozen advertisements in the August 6, 1776, edition of his newspaper.  They appeared at the end of the issue, following “EXTRACTS from the Minutes of the Proceedings of the Convention for the State of Pennsylvania” held in Philadelphia shortly after the Continental Congress declared independence and news updates from Williamsburg, Boston, Providence, Newport, New Haven, and New York.  Immediately above the first advertisement, Towne issued instructions to prospective advertisers: “No advertisement will be inserted in this paper, if the money be not sent with it.”  The printer included three asterisks to call attention to his notice.

Historians of the early American press have long contended that newspaper printers extended generous credit to subscribers but insisted that advertisers had to pay in advance.  Printers, they explain, prioritized their circulation numbers as a means encouraging advertisers to purchase space in their newspapers.  In turn, revenue from advertising more than made up for losses from subscribers who did not pay.  Notices like this one from Towne likely contributed to that narrative.  Other printers sometimes ran similar notices … yet some also ran notices calling on advertisers to make payment, suggesting that they did not require advertisers to submit payment with the copy for their advertisements.  In addition, Towne’s notice indicates his policy for new advertisements that he anticipated receiving at his printing office but did not necessarily reflect the practice he previously adopted.  In an address to readers that ran in the first issue of the Pennsylvania Evening Post, Towne solicited advertisements, stating that they “shall be punctually and conspicuously inserted at the usual Rates,” but he did not specify those rates, nor did he demand payment in advance.  Perhaps Towne found it necessary to institute a new policy – payment in advance – only after too many advertisers neglected to pay for their notices in a timely fashion.

Slavery Advertisements Published August 6, 1776

Carl Robert Keyes Slavery Adverts 250 Project

The Slavery Adverts 250 Project chronicles the role of newspaper advertising in perpetuating slavery in the era of the American Revolution. The project seeks to reveal the ubiquity of slavery in eighteenth-century life from New England to Georgia by republishing advertisements about enslaved people – for sale as individuals or in groups, wanted to purchase or for hire for short periods, runaways who liberated themselves, and those who were subsequently captured and confined in jails and workhouses – in daily digests on this site as well as in real time via the @SlaveAdverts250 Twitter feed, utilizing twenty-first-century media to stand in for the print media of the eighteenth century.

The project aims to provide modern audiences with a sense of just how often colonizers encountered these advertisements in their daily lives. Enslaved men, women, and children appeared in print somewhere in the colonies almost every single day. Those advertisements served as a constant backdrop for social, cultural, economic, and political life in colonial and revolutionary America. Colonizers who did not purport to own enslaved people were still confronted with slavery as well as invited to maintain the system by purchasing enslaved men, women, and children or assisting in the capture of so-called “runaways” who sought to free themselves from bondage. The frequency of these newspaper advertisements suggests just how embedded slavery was in colonial and revolutionary American culture in everyday interactions beyond the printed page.

These advertisements also testify to the experiences of enslaved men, women, and children, though readers must consider that those experiences have been remediated through descriptions offered by enslavers rather than enslaved people themselves. Often unnamed in the advertisements, enslaved men, women, and children were not invisible or unimportant in early America.

These advertisements appeared in revolutionary American newspapers 250 years ago today.

Dunlap’s Maryland Gazette (August 6, 1776).

August 5

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , , , ,

What was advertised in a revolutionary American newspaper 250 years ago today?

Connecticut Courant (August 5, 1776).

“Old books he can metamorphose into new.”

When Nathaniel Patten, a bookseller, bookbinder, and stationer, “opened shop under the Printing-Office in Hartford” in the summer of 1776, he placed an advertisement in the Connecticut Courant.  He described himself as a “BOOK-BINDER and STATIONER from BOSTON” even though he had been pursuing those trades in Norwich, Connecticut, for more than two years.  He may have believed that prospective customers considered a bookbinder from Boston more qualified than one from Norwich.  He stated that he had been “regularly bred” to bookbinding; in other words, he received training as a youth, perhaps as an apprentice and perhaps in Boston.  That prompted Patten to confidently proclaim that he could “bind, gild, and letter books in as splendid a manner as if done in London.”  Consumers may have considered a bookbinder from Boston more likely to possess such skills than a bookbinder from Norwich.

Patten sought to dazzle prospective customers with a description of what he could do to their books when entrusted to him for new bindings.  “Old books,” he declared, “he can metamorphose into new.”  Yet that promise held only as long as the books remained on shelves to impress those who saw them, but not necessarily upon closer examination.  The bookbinder clarified that “the difference will not be perceptible to those who do not open them.”  Patten encouraged readers to judge a book by its cover … and by its binding and by the gilded edges of its pages.  Appearances mattered, at least according to the bookbinder seeking customers after arriving in a new town.

Patten had some experience making both appeals.  The copy in the first paragraph of his advertisement in the Connecticut Courant replicated copy from the advertisement in which he introduced himself to residents of Norwich and nearby towns in the Connecticut Journal two years earlier, suggesting that Patten clipped the notice from the newspaper or retained his correspondence with the printer.  He apparently considered the appeals effective since he deployed them again.  Artisans often touted their training and skill.  Patten merely adopted a popular marketing strategy when he did so.  His claim about transforming old books, however, was not one that other bookbinders used.  Patten seemingly devised it on his own when deciding the best way to market his services.

Slavery Advertisements Published August 5, 1776

Carl Robert Keyes Slavery Adverts 250 Project

The Slavery Adverts 250 Project chronicles the role of newspaper advertising in perpetuating slavery in the era of the American Revolution. The project seeks to reveal the ubiquity of slavery in eighteenth-century life from New England to Georgia by republishing advertisements about enslaved people – for sale as individuals or in groups, wanted to purchase or for hire for short periods, runaways who liberated themselves, and those who were subsequently captured and confined in jails and workhouses – in daily digests on this site as well as in real time via the @SlaveAdverts250 Twitter feed, utilizing twenty-first-century media to stand in for the print media of the eighteenth century.

The project aims to provide modern audiences with a sense of just how often colonizers encountered these advertisements in their daily lives. Enslaved men, women, and children appeared in print somewhere in the colonies almost every single day. Those advertisements served as a constant backdrop for social, cultural, economic, and political life in colonial and revolutionary America. Colonizers who did not purport to own enslaved people were still confronted with slavery as well as invited to maintain the system by purchasing enslaved men, women, and children or assisting in the capture of so-called “runaways” who sought to free themselves from bondage. The frequency of these newspaper advertisements suggests just how embedded slavery was in colonial and revolutionary American culture in everyday interactions beyond the printed page.

These advertisements also testify to the experiences of enslaved men, women, and children, though readers must consider that those experiences have been remediated through descriptions offered by enslavers rather than enslaved people themselves. Often unnamed in the advertisements, enslaved men, women, and children were not invisible or unimportant in early America.

These advertisements appeared in revolutionary American newspapers 250 years ago today.

Boston-Gazette (August 5, 1776).

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Boston-Gazette (August 5, 1776).

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New-York Gazette and Weekly Mercury (August 5, 1776).

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New-York Gazette and Weekly Mercury (August 5, 1776).

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New-York Gazette and Weekly Mercury (August 5, 1776).

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Norwich Packet (August 5, 1776).

August 4

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , , ,

What was advertised in a revolutionary American newspaper 250 years ago this week?

Pennsylvania Ledger (August 3, 1776).

“For the benefit of others I desire that you may make my case public, that those being imposed upon and labouring under the same complaint may know where to apply for a cure.”

Testimonials worked!  Anthony Yeldall must have thought so because the apothecary repeatedly included testimonials from grateful patients in his newspaper advertisements.  Perhaps some patients mentioned testimonials they read in his advertisements when they consulted him “at his Medicinal ware house” in Philadelphia, prompting him to publish more testimonials.  The testimonials often accounted for much more space than any copy that Yeldall wrote himself.  His advertisement in the August 3, 1776, edition of the Pennsylvania Ledger, for instance, consisted of five paragraphs.  The last four were testimonials that his patients stated that they wanted published “[f]or the benefit of others.”  It was one thing for the apothecary to claim that his “Abilities are well known through most parts of the United Colonies,” but the testimonials demonstrated that was indeed the case.  Joseph Spenser, “Grocer in Second-street,” Benjamin Wilson, “Elizabeth-town, New-Jersey,” Christopher Hughes, “Bedminster-township, Bucks County, Pennsylvania,” and William Bell, “Vincent township, Chester County, Pennsylvania,” each praised the treatment that “DOCTOR YELDALL” provided.

Those testimonials had some common features that suggest Yeldall may have worked with his patients in composing their testimonials or they may have used testimonials that appeared in previous advertisements as models.  Three of the testimonials began with “For the benefit of others” and a request “that my case may be made public” (or some close variation of that phrase).  Hughes expressed similar sentiments but deviated from the formulaic language used by the others: “being desirous that they may reap the same benefit that I have done, I desire that you may make my case public.”  Each testimonial made clear that Yeldall published success stories at the behest of patients he returned to good health.  They did not make their way into print solely due to the self-interest of an apothecary seeking more patients.  Each also told a frustrating story about seeking medical care from physicians and surgeons whose assistance proved ineffective before turning to Yeldall for treatments that returned them to full health.  Spenser, for instance, “applied to several able Physicians in the city, but could find no relief” for a pain that cause him to lose the use of his arm.  He then turned to Yeldall, “who in a short time removed the pain, restored the use of my arm, and I now follow my business.”

Yeldall certainly considered testimonials effective when he decided on his marketing strategy.  He would not have continued to publish them (and invest so much in the space required for each testimonial) if he did believe that they yielded a return on his investment in placing them in the public prints.  He likely appreciated that testimonials helped build trust with patients before they even consulted him for “advice and medicines.”

August 3

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , ,

What was advertised in a revolutionary American newspaper 250 years ago today?

Constitutional Gazette (August 3, 1776).

“Four weeks, for FIVE Shillings, and One Shilling, for each week afterwards.”

When the Constitutional Gazette completed its first year of publication, John Anderson, the printer, updated the masthead to include both a volume number and an issue number.  The masthead previously featured only an issue number.  The July 31, 1776, edition was the first with both: “VOL. II” AND “NUMB. 105.”  That was not the only way that Anderson marked the conclusion of one year and the beginning of another.  The advertisements in the August 3 edition started with a notice from the printer.

Anderson declared that he “takes this method, of returning his unfeigned thanks, to those Gentlemen, who, favoured him, with their custom, for the NEW-YORK CONSTITUTIONAL GAZETTE, of last year, and hopes for a continuance of their favours.”  In addition to expressing appreciation to his subscribers, Anderson encouraged them to renew their subscriptions.  To that end, he pledged that “he shall, still continue, to make it, his constant study and endeavour, that the CONSTITUTIONAL GAZETTE, shall be, a vehicle, of foreign, as well as domestic intelligence.”  In other words, he promised to publish all the news that was fit to print!

He also used the occasion to solicit advertisements.  “Those Gentlemen, who chuse to advertise in the CONSTITUTIONAL GAZETTE,” Anderson declared, “shall, (in a conspicuous manner) be inserted, (if short) four weeks, for FIVE Shillings, and One Shilling, for each week afterwards.”  Most printers did not regularly disclose the fees they charged for advertisement, though they sometimes mentioned “the usual rates” with an expectation that prospective advertisers were already familiar with them.  A few printers included the price of advertising in the masthead or the colophon, but most did not.  That made Anderson’s disclosure of what he charged to run advertisements a relatively rare occurrence.

Subscriptions and advertisements accounted for only two of the revenue streams that Anderson cultivated.  He concluded his notice with a reminder that “Printing, of all sorts,” including handbills, broadsides, trade cards, and other advertising ephemera, “is done, in the neatest manner, with care and expedition, and on the shortest notice” at his printing office.  Anderson commemorated a full year of publishing the Constitutional Gazette by simultaneously thanking his customers and encouraging all readers to place the orders for subscriptions, advertisements, and job printing necessary to keep his press busy and the newspaper in print.  He did not call on subscribers to make overdue payments, as printers often did in their notices, but instead focused on the services he provided.

Slavery Advertisements Published August 3, 1776

Carl Robert Keyes Slavery Adverts 250 Project

The Slavery Adverts 250 Project chronicles the role of newspaper advertising in perpetuating slavery in the era of the American Revolution. The project seeks to reveal the ubiquity of slavery in eighteenth-century life from New England to Georgia by republishing advertisements about enslaved people – for sale as individuals or in groups, wanted to purchase or for hire for short periods, runaways who liberated themselves, and those who were subsequently captured and confined in jails and workhouses – in daily digests on this site as well as in real time via the @SlaveAdverts250 Twitter feed, utilizing twenty-first-century media to stand in for the print media of the eighteenth century.

The project aims to provide modern audiences with a sense of just how often colonizers encountered these advertisements in their daily lives. Enslaved men, women, and children appeared in print somewhere in the colonies almost every single day. Those advertisements served as a constant backdrop for social, cultural, economic, and political life in colonial and revolutionary America. Colonizers who did not purport to own enslaved people were still confronted with slavery as well as invited to maintain the system by purchasing enslaved men, women, and children or assisting in the capture of so-called “runaways” who sought to free themselves from bondage. The frequency of these newspaper advertisements suggests just how embedded slavery was in colonial and revolutionary American culture in everyday interactions beyond the printed page.

These advertisements also testify to the experiences of enslaved men, women, and children, though readers must consider that those experiences have been remediated through descriptions offered by enslavers rather than enslaved people themselves. Often unnamed in the advertisements, enslaved men, women, and children were not invisible or unimportant in early America.

These advertisements appeared in revolutionary American newspapers 250 years ago today.

Constitutional Gazette (August 3, 1776).

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Pennsylvania Ledger (August 3, 1776).

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Providence Gazette (August 3, 1776).

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Virginia Gazette [Dixon and Hunter] (August 3, 1776).

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Virginia Gazette [Dixon and Hunter] (August 3, 1776).

August 2

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , , ,

What was advertised in a revolutionary American newspaper 250 years ago today?

New-England Chronicle (August 2, 1776).

“The Sale of the CARGO of the Prize Ship Lady JULIANA, from Jamaica.”

On August 2, 1776, Joseph Russell, an auctioneer, placed advertisements about an upcoming sale in both newspapers published in Boston, the Continental Journal and the New-England Chronicle.  He advised readers that “the Sale of the CARGO of the Prize Ship Lady JULIANA, from Jamaica,” would begin in the morning on the following Wednesday.  That cargo included “choice Sugars,” rum, ginger, “568 Jamaica Hides, very large,” “63 Planks of Mohogony,” cocoa, tortoise shell, “old Copper, Brass and Pewter,” and “17 Elephants Teeth.”  Russell noted that the ship was “now laying at the Honourable JOHN HANCOCK, Esqr’s Wharf,” but did not indicate whether prospective bidders were welcome to examine the cargo before it went up for bids.

He did, however, provide a list of “CONDITIONS of SALE.”  That was unusual in an advertisement for an auction, but Russell may have considered it necessary since this auction concerned the cargo of a prize ship rather than a private auction.  Some of the proceeds would be divided among the privateers who captured the ship with the remainder going to the government.  In other instances, bidders sought the best possible bargains, but the “CONDITIONS” for this auction required that “every Bidder shall advance 5-per Cent. on every Bid.”  That made bids increase more substantially than smaller increments that bidders might have otherwise preferred.  Russell also informed prospective bidders that “every Purchaser shall pay down as Earnest Money, 10-per Cent. and the Remainder in three Days after the Purchase.”  The auctioneer had no intention of extending credit for long periods.  The winning bidders had to put down a deposit immediately and submit the rest of the payment within three days.  Failure to do so meant not only losing the goods but also “Forfeiture of the advance Money.”  Such “CONDITIONS” warned prospective bidders not to conduct themselves according to the resources available to them on the day of the auction.  The final condition concerned disputes “between two or more Bidders.”  In such cases, “the Article in Dispute shall be put up again.”  The auctioneer expected good behavior and an orderly process.  Those who did not abide risked losing out on the cargo they hoped to acquire at the auction.

Slavery Advertisements Published August 2, 1776

Carl Robert Keyes Slavery Adverts 250 Project

The Slavery Adverts 250 Project chronicles the role of newspaper advertising in perpetuating slavery in the era of the American Revolution. The project seeks to reveal the ubiquity of slavery in eighteenth-century life from New England to Georgia by republishing advertisements about enslaved people – for sale as individuals or in groups, wanted to purchase or for hire for short periods, runaways who liberated themselves, and those who were subsequently captured and confined in jails and workhouses – in daily digests on this site as well as in real time via the @SlaveAdverts250 Twitter feed, utilizing twenty-first-century media to stand in for the print media of the eighteenth century.

The project aims to provide modern audiences with a sense of just how often colonizers encountered these advertisements in their daily lives. Enslaved men, women, and children appeared in print somewhere in the colonies almost every single day. Those advertisements served as a constant backdrop for social, cultural, economic, and political life in colonial and revolutionary America. Colonizers who did not purport to own enslaved people were still confronted with slavery as well as invited to maintain the system by purchasing enslaved men, women, and children or assisting in the capture of so-called “runaways” who sought to free themselves from bondage. The frequency of these newspaper advertisements suggests just how embedded slavery was in colonial and revolutionary American culture in everyday interactions beyond the printed page.

These advertisements also testify to the experiences of enslaved men, women, and children, though readers must consider that those experiences have been remediated through descriptions offered by enslavers rather than enslaved people themselves. Often unnamed in the advertisements, enslaved men, women, and children were not invisible or unimportant in early America.

These advertisements appeared in revolutionary American newspapers 250 years ago today.

Connecticut Gazette (August 2, 1776).

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Connecticut Gazette (August 2, 1776).

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Continental Journal (August 2, 1776).

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Essex Journal (August 2, 1776).

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New-England Chronicle (August 2, 1776).

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New-England Chronicle (August 2, 1776).

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Virginia Gazette [Purdie] (August 2, 1776).

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Virginia Gazette [Purdie] (August 2, 1776).

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Virginia Gazette [Purdie] (August 2, 1776).

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Virginia Gazette [Purdie] (August 2, 1776).

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Virginia Gazette [Purdie] (August 2, 1776).

August 1

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , ,

What was advertised in a revolutionary American newspaper 250 years ago today?

Pennsylvania Evening Post (August 1, 1776).

“The managers hope for public assistance in detecting the villain.”

Reports of burglaries and robberies frequently appeared among the advertisements in early American newspapers, but this notice with a headline that proclaimed, “ROBBERY,” was different than most.  Rather than a house or shop that had been targeted, this time “the Cellar of the Public Manufactory at the corner of Market and Ninth streets” in Philadelphia “was broke open” sometime during the night of July 29, 1776.  The culprits absconded with “two pieces of goods cut out of the looms,” approximately “twenty yards of Cotton, Barragon, or Fustian” and approximately “fifty yards of narrow striped Corded Dimity.”  That was quite a haul, but the managers of the Public Manufactory noted that the fabrics were “rough and unfinished,” making them easy to recognize “if offered for sale, or carried to any of the bleachyards” for processing.

The managers requested “public assistance in detecting the villain” who perpetrated this crime.  They hoped that merchants, shopkeepers, millers, consumers, or anyone else who might spot these stolen textiles would aid them in “detecting the Robber, so that he may be prosecuted to conviction.”  In return, they would receive “FIFTY DOLLARS Reward.”  The size of the reward testified not only to the value of the fabrics but also to patriotic mission of the Public Manufactory.  It had been established to produce textiles that local consumers could purchase instead of imported goods.  The managers believed that the Public Manufactory played a vital role in making “domestic manufactures” that supported the local economy and reduced reliance on imports.  This enterprise played a symbolic as well as practical role in the contest with Great Britain.  The managers lamented that “losses of this kind (by discouraging weavers and manufacturers) may prove a fatal injury to America.”  Less than a month after the Continental Congress declared independence, the managers of the Public Manufactory envisioned high stakes for this “ROBBERY.”  The “villain” did not merely deprive them of several years of unfinished fabric; instead, he demoralized weavers who contributed to the American cause and might have even out the fate of the entire nation in jeopardy.  The managers of the Public Manufactory framed this unfortunate event and the potential reverberations as more than just everyday theft.